


Keep the faith, irmão!

by Boxcult (Brynnen), Brynnen



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Candomblé, D.Va's F-bomb caused the rating, Friendship, Gen, Hana wants to party, Numbani is in Nigeria right?, Religious tolerance, Vodun - Freeform, We're all multicultural here
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-24
Updated: 2017-09-24
Packaged: 2019-01-05 00:02:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 989
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12179061
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Brynnen/pseuds/Boxcult, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Brynnen/pseuds/Brynnen
Summary: A little slip in battle results in Lucio sharing a detail he hadn't got around to mentioning.





	Keep the faith, irmão!

'Get back to the extraction point!' Soldier 76's order was broadcast across the whole mission team's ear-pieces, acknowledged in a panoply of different grunts and languages as the hard-pressed group tried to get out in as few pieces as possible.

  
Lúcio twisted as he sprang, rebounding off a wall and firing his sonic gun to try and scatter the Talon agents penning him in. They'd herded him away from the rest of the team, keeping his healing beats out of range of his friends and trying to take him down. They underestimated Lúcio Correia dos Santos, lotsa people did, but he was still penned in, twisting and turning, trying to get away to the evac point.

  
'Gonna need a hand here, someone!' He managed to gasp out between grunts of exertion as he sent a sniper tumbling from their perch with a well-placed soundwave blast. Great, it was down to twelve against one. Oh yeah, he had 'em where he wanted now; he joked to himself.

  
'Your safety is my primary concern!' The West African accented tones of his teammate were punctuated by gunfire as two of Lúcio's favourite tanks charged into the fray, D.Va rocketing over the green and yellow hulk of Orisa.

  
The two of them emptied the place, but for the guy who'd got into melee range of Lúcio, but after a brief struggle Lúcio dropped onto one hand, using a move he hadn't tried since childhood games of capoeira as he swung his armoured legs up and into the goon's head and shoulder.

  
'Let's get out of here!' Hana cried, gun sweeping the battleground to check for any undetected enemies as Lucio picked himself up, gathered up his sonic gun again and dusted himself off. He started jogging after the MEKA, but suddenly halted as he realised the absence of a little weight bouncing against his chest. His stomach dropped in horror. It was gone!

  
With a curse he spun around and ran back to the alley and searched around frantically, ignoring Hana and Orisa's confused shouts. There! In that last agent's hand, the cord poked out from between his rapidly stiffening fingers. Lúcio pried the fist open and switched his song over to 'We Move Together As One', speeding back towards the extraction point, the music sweeping up his two rescuers as he passed them. 'Thanks guys, I owe you one!'

  
'What the Fuck was that about, Lúcio?' Hana demanded as they piled into the chopper and the two humans sprawled on the floor, panting desperately. Whatever else she said was drowned out by the roar of the helicopter motors and was probably profane.

  
Lúcio opened his hand silently and showed her the little fabric thing he clutched.

  
Hana frowned in utter bemusement at the weird little thing, but Orisa made a noise of happy recognition. 'A gris-gris! Are you a vodouist? Or do you practice another Traditional African Religion?' The omnic sounded delighted.

  
Lúcio gave a little laugh. 'Not quite, I'm Candomblé.'

  
Orisa paused for a moment, a soft sound indicating she was searching her memory drives. 'Oh, so related to Traditional African Religion, but a development from the forced amalgamation of many tribes in the times of slavery. You honour your Lwa by following your destiny. Not quite like me and Efi then, but you still honour the Lwa.' Her voice was rich with approval as she recognised his path and appeared to understand how he synthesised the theories of the religion into his way of life.

  
'Orishas.' Lúcio offered the correct term from his own sect, but looked to the huge omnic with a sense of wonder. He shouldn't have been surprised that she too might have a faith, anyone who had met Zenyatta or who had heard of Mondatta should know that the world of religion was not closed to omnics. 'You're vodouists? I thought Numbani was evenly split between Christian and Muslim populations?'

  
'Efi is Egun.' She dropped the ethnic group's name into the conversation as if it would explain everything and Lúcio realised he would need to do a lot of reading up on Nigerian and West African culture and history to be able to probably get all the meaning out of that simple statement. The modern world might be traversable in a few hours, but humanity remained as wonderfully diverse and interesting as ever.

  
'Wait, wait, wait.' Hana interrupted, making a 'time out' gesture with her hands. 'Orisa is a voodoo omnic and you're sort-of voodoo-ish?'

  
Lúcio wanted to wince at the mispronounciation and over-simplification, but Hana was interested rather than being weird about it, so he just grinned. 'It's a little more complicated than that, but yeah.'

  
'You put out a Christmas message to all your fans last year!'

  
'And an Eid message, a Channukah message, a Yule greeting and quite a lot of other religious and cultural festivals too, like Divali, Chinese New Year and Holi.' He shrugged. 'I don't care what faith my fans have, it just means more reasons for us to celebrate together.'

  
Hana nodded as if he'd said something truly profound. 'You know, it's Chuseok coming up soon, why don't I share one of my culture's reasons to party and you can tell me more about uh, Camdomla?'

  
'Candomblé.' He corrected gently. 'That sounds great.'

  
'Huh, a team get together not based on training might help with group unity too.' Soldier 76 agreed thoughtfully. 'I'd been thinking about a Thanksgiving meal, but with a team this diverse in origin we're not short on reasons for a gathering.'

  
'76 says yes! Awesome! You won't regret this, old man, this'll be the best party you ever saw!'

  
The sheer volume and enthusiasm in Hana's voice almost made 76 think twice, but she was right, they needed something to look forward to. He only hoped she didn't send too many team members to the infirmary with the spiciness of her beloved traditional dishes.

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, I kept the religious detail very light to avoid making too many cringe-worthy errors, but if you are more familiar with Vodun, Candomblé or West African culture and history and you spotted a mistake, please let me know.
> 
> This was inspired by DoctorQui's fix 25th of Kislev, in that it got me thinking about OW characters' faiths and since my two favourite characters are Lucio and Orisa and there was a theory Orisa's name comes from 'orisha'.... Several hours of reading about Traditional African Religions and the religions which developed from them as a result of slavery resulted in the first draft of this messy thing.


End file.
